Miles to Go
by Save the Rave
Summary: An incident during a hunt has led to some interesting repercussions, including a walk in a desert and Dean doesn't even know how he managed to get there in the first place. Destiel


_The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,  
__But I have promises to keep,  
__And miles to go before I sleep,  
__And miles to go before I sleep._

He feels like a man who has spent a lifetime and a half trudging through a desert. Parched, dirty, drained, and utterly lost. The sun overhead beats down, relentless, and he can feel beads of sweat rolling down his neck, under the collar of his faded t-shirt, and down over his back - the curve of his spine, the dip of his lower back until it vaporizes at the hem of his jeans because his body feels like it's on fire. Blisters are forming on his feet because of the miles upon miles he's walked.

Dean stops in the middle of the desert, that Death's head of a sun blazing overhead. There is no wind to speak of, making the dead heat of the middle of the day a suffocating one. He doesn't know how he hasn't passed out from exhaustion or dehydration, but he also doesn't know how he got here in the first place. The last he remembered was coming back from a hunt with Sam. Somewhere in Wisconsin, they had been hunting a few demons who were stirring up a little more shit than what they were worth. They had nailed the demons, and in the process, Dean had taken a blow to the head. The blow had been a nasty one, leaving him with a line of vision that tripled every now and then. They had been in the Impala, on the way back to the motel, when he had passed out cold at the wheel. There was a vague memory of Sam freaking out and taking the wheel as his vision went white at the edges and black in the middle, but after that, nothing.

And now there is nothing. Nothing but an endless desert and a nasty sunburn he'd be feeling for weeks after that.

"Hello, Dean."

The voice doesn't startle him, not like it does every other time, but he is still surprised to hear Castiel's flat, nearly toneless voice. It's a welcome sound, one that warms his weary bones in a way the sun or a good bottle of whisky can't. Dean slows to a stop, pauses, and then looks back to the angel in the ratty trench coat. Castiel stares at him for a long moment, eyes searching beneath a cinched brow.

"Hey, Cas. You joinin' me on a little stroll in the desert?"

Castiel licks his dry lips and then nods, seeing no reason to say no to him - he is here, after all, and the eldest Winchester wonders briefly to himself if there is a reason why Castiel has shown up, or if Cas even knows why he's here in the first place. Pushing the thoughts from his mind because deep down he's damn good and grateful to see the angel at his side, Dean resumes walking, head down, plaid shirt tied around his waist, Castiel remaining a few steps behind him until he quickens his pace to fall in step beside the hunter. He feels a little like he did the day when Cas hauled him up from six-feet-under, just a little wearier and worse for the wear, somehow.

"You have very odd dreams, Dean Winchester. It is almost concerning."

Ah, so that's what this is. With that little revelation, everything starts to fall into place, the heat feels less real and then it gets to the point when the warmth vanishes altogether. A dreamscape with no feeling to it whatsoever is the best dreamscape, the safest one. "Yeah, I guess I do, don't I?" He looks over to the angel, grinning and chuckling as his companion loosens his tie and rolls up the sleeve of his shirt and jacket.

"We don't have to walk in the desert, you know," says Cas quietly. "This is a rather uncomfortable experience."

Dean shrugs. Castiel is right; it's a dream, of course they don't have to be walking through the desert. The world around him wavers in and out of focus for a brief moment. Why stay out in the open and risk being an easy prey to the things that might have been lurking in his head when he could be hiding himself?

And, as easily as that, they are no longer in the desert, no longer treading through endless grains of sand, but they are walking through a forest. It is ancient, perhaps one of the first forests in the world. Maybe it's as old as God. Trees that reach the sky block out the sun. The silence is oppressive, as suffocating as the heat he had previously been suffering through. Around them the world is damp-smelling, cool, and fresh. Dean stops, feeling his skin prickle from the sudden change. Castiel walks a few paces ahead of the hunter, stops, and turns back to face him.

"Where are we now?" asks the angel, watching as Dean moves to sit upon a stump.

"A forest, genius, where the hell do you think we are?"

Castiel says nothing, but he gives Dean a long, hard look. Soul-searching, confused, and tired. "What are you hiding from? No one can find you here, Dean."

"You found me, didn't you?"

Lowering his head, sighing heavily, Castiel shakes his head before returning to sit beside Dean, hunching forward and staring around them. "Of course I found you, Dean, I'm an angel. But you have nothing else to worry about, so perhaps we should leave this place."

"You don't know what goes on in my head, Cas," sighs Dean. "And I damn well think you wouldn't want to know."

"No, you're probably right," murmurs the angel. "But, Dean, you need to wake up. Otherwise Sam is probably going to end up driving you to the nearest hospital, and who knows how long you'll be there for."

Hospital? Wake up? Hell, he didn't even know he was dreaming until Castiel mentioned it to him. So, he wasn't just asleep. Maybe he was comatose? Well, shit happened. And this shit happening prevented him from having to deal with Doomsday, which was currently riding up the road with bells on. "Dude, how hard did that demon whack me?"

"With a hammer, Dean, and very hard by a very pissed off demon," says Castiel. "It's a wonder that you even managed to get up, walk away, and drive a few miles before being overcome. You're lucky it didn't kill you or render you more brain-dead than what you already are."

"Thanks for that."

"Oh, don't mention it."

Reaching over, Dean shoves Castiel off the rock he's seated upon, sending him flying into the brush with a startled shout. And then the angel was stood in front of him again, smouldering, arms folded over his chest. "Dean, please, your condition is serious."

"Oh, don't mention it, Cas," says Dean, smile broad and his eyes lighting up a little. The anger seems to leave the angel and he deflates a little, shaking his head.

Crouching down before him, blue eyes sad, Castiel takes Dean's face in his dry hands and all of a sudden he looks so haggard, so frightened. "Dean, please, you need to wake up."

"Why?" asks Dean. "I like it here. You're not gonna take that away from me, are you?"

"But this place isn't real. Out there is. Out there is where you're needed," Cas pleads. He grows more and more visibly stressed with each moment. "By more people than perhaps you realize."

Dean finds his fingers twitching because he needs a drink. Something strong that'll make his throat burn on the way down and will leave him feeling nasty the next day should he drink too much. "No, I'm not," sighs Dean. "And this place may not be real, but it's better than what I've had in a long time. Maybe this'll be my heaven. A nice place in the middle of the woods where I can lie around all day and do absolutely nothing. Find a cabin, maybe, get cozy and hunker down for the rest of eternity." As he says this, the world around him begins to feel more solid, like it's actually beginning to materialize.

For a moment, Castiel flickers before him, like he's there one second and gone the next, only to return just as fast. His expression is grave. "Dean, you need to wake up. Now." The hands return to his face, and for a moment he feels the ghost of Castiel's breath cross his face, his lips. Dean licks his own and wonders how close his angel is going to get. When he speaks next, his voice breaks dangerously. "I'm not going back there without you. Dean, I can't. I won't."

"Cas, why do you always take it upon yourself to talk me down from the ledge?" asks Dean. "What if I want to be here? Has that thought ever crossed your mind?"

"More times than I'd like to admit." His face is closer and personal space means nothing to him. It's just two words with definitions put together, a silly social construct, and he gives them no regard. For a change, Dean's perfectly fine with it. "I will wake you up if I must."

"Oh, will you now? Good luck with that, because I think I might be staying for a while."

(He likes the shape of Castiel's lips, likes the paleness of them, and for a brief moment he wonders what they're like, what they'd feel like beneath his own.)

"Yes, Dean, I will."

And then a searing hot pain flares through his body and Dean opens his mouth to scream but nothing comes out. It's easily the most painful thing he's ever experienced in his entire life. There's a glowing light from the center of his body and he see's Castiel's face, so full of regret and his eyes begging for forgiveness, turned downwards as he sticks his arm into his body and—

Dean gasps, choking on the tube down his throat and ripping away the ones that are up his nose, then the one that's down his throat.

No. No. No. _No._

On a heart monitor he can hear the erratic, crazed beating of his ticker and then he lies back when he throws the tubes to the side, onto the floor. When he inhales all he gets is the scent of antiseptics and cleaners and it makes him retch. His head is throbbing so badly he can barely see, everything surrounding him darkly coloured blobs of existence, but he can hear as a chair is knocked over and can make out Sam's voice, panicked and terrified. He sounds like a little kid again. Dean reaches out and, in his near blindness, grabs his little brother's hand, gives it a squeeze, and then lets it drop. Everything around him is so goddamn loud and it makes his head hurt more than what it already does.

"Hey, Sammy?" His voice is dry, brittle-sounding. He gives a hacking cough that makes his head feel like it's going to explode. Something dribbles down the corner of his mouth, over his cheek, but it's quickly wiped away by Sam. "Do me a favour, would you?"

"Yes, of course, what is it?" He feels the bed sink a little beneath the weight of his brother, and Dean sighs. The coolness of the previous world, of his forest, has vanished, and he hates it for a moment, wishing he was back there. Back where it was safe, back where it was just him. Where it could have been just him for a long, long time. Sam would have found him someday, he had faith in that much.

"Take some of my blood, paint a sigil on the wall, and blast Cas back to wherever the fuck he came from the moment you see him, got it?"


End file.
